Ghana has one player over 30, and that's Michael Essien who is the same age as Clint Dempsey. Asamoah Gyan is 28, Boateng is 27, Muntari is 29.

Their midfield is stacked with Serie A starters and Boateng, their forwards minus Gyan are young but talented and have been scoring lately. However, their goalkeeper is inexperienced on the international level and their defense is young and without much top-level experience; John Boye has been an on-again off-again defender for Rennes for the past few seasons, Harrison Aful plays in Tunisia and Samuel Inkoom has been bouncing around on loan trying to find consistent playing time for the past couple seasons, and has been largely unsuccessful.

Despite the relative high level inexperience among many of their players though, it's not without talent. Six of the players won the 2009 U-20 World Cup against Brazil, and are peaking in their mid-20s now.

There midfield is ridiculously talented compared to ours. However they aren't all going to start, or they are going to start out of position. And it can be stereotyping but a lot of Africans start out at much earlier ages and peak sooner, and burn out early (can only get so many miles on your legs).

I think if MB and Jones can control essien then Jozy, Clint, and Zusi, with Fab and Chndler can cause fits to Ghana. Also the main thing Im concerned with is our defending against the counter and that's not Ghana's strong suit.

2toneTen-Towns

Post #17

Wednesday June 4, 2014 8:54pm

Joined Jul 2012
Total Posts: 5,589

Essien isn't half of the player he used to be. Essien and Muntari were rarely played for AC Milan in the second half of the season. Both are out of form, and Essien is slow now. Bradley can definitely dominate that midfield.

mmeeCulver City, CA

Post #18

Wednesday June 4, 2014 11:12pm

Joined Mar 2014
Total Posts: 339

I will bask in your optimism, since I can't muster much of my own. I do think that our first two games are anybody's game, if Ronaldo is out and Ghana loses key 1v1 challenges against our D. Against Germany, we're praying to tie based on the 'rest the starters' circumstances.

Accuweather.com :

Natal RN Brazil, June 16th, 7pm local:
day high 85 F, showers (feels like 86 F)
so maybe like 75-80 F at 7pm?

Manaus Brazil, June 22nd, 7pm local:
day high 86 F, showers, very humid (feels like 99 F)
so maybe like 77-82 at 7pm, feeling like 85-90 F?

This is their winter, people!
No wonder they like to go around basically naked in the summer.

mmeeCulver City, CA

Post #19

Wednesday June 4, 2014 11:13pm

Joined Mar 2014
Total Posts: 339

Anyone care to entertain a side bet that we will have 1 soft PK called against us, and no soft PKs called for us? $100?

2toneTen-Towns

Post #20

Friday June 6, 2014 8:34pm

Joined Jul 2012
Total Posts: 5,589

Watching Germany V Armenia and Reus just injured his ankle pretty bad. He had to be helped off of the pitch. Looks to be either a broken ankle or high ankle sprain.

Can you say Germany has some problems?

admsghs27

Post #21

Friday June 6, 2014 9:02pm

Joined Nov 2012
Total Posts: 3,660

Is neur on the 23 ?

USAGunnerWest Palm Beach

Post #22

Friday June 6, 2014 9:10pm

Joined Jul 2013
Total Posts: 226

at what point do they call in gomez?

scratch that he still isn't ready.

www.westpalmbeachchurchofchrist.com

skanglesDC

Post #23

Sunday June 8, 2014 3:06pm

Joined Jan 2013
Total Posts: 2,334

I find the warm up strategy used by Ghana and especially Portugal slightly risky.

Ghana faces South Korea in Miami tomorrow whilst Portugal plays Ireland in New York on Tuesday. These are the last two friendlies involving World Cup teams. Most teams wrapped up their preparation over the last few days.

I would rather go get acclimated and start my final preparation in Brazil than putz around with another Friendly in the US.

skanglesDC

Post #24

Tuesday June 10, 2014 12:29am

Joined Jan 2013
Total Posts: 2,334

Using the FIFA rankings as a barometer Group G is no longer the Group of Death as Group D now has an average FIFA ranking of 13.5 compared to Group G's 14.0.

First comment, the FIFA ratings are stupid and Ghana is severely underrated. Even with a healthy Saborio Costa Rica at #28 doesn't pose the same threat as Ghana at #37. Costa Rica plays extremely well at home but in a neutral venue I would much rather face los Ticos than the Black Stars.

Second, if we look at the rest of the teams from our Pot (North America and Asia) how many would you want to switch with from the US perspective?

I definitely would not switch groups with Australia or Costa Rica. These groups would be terrible.

Spain
Chile
Netherlands
USA

or

Uruguay
Italy
England
USA

Ironically, FIFA has Chile and the Netherlands ranked below us but Group B with the US would be my least desired Group, all else equal.

Portugal and Germany are really daunting but the game against Ghana is winnable. Don't get me wrong, it is very possible for Ghana to take the points from us too but if we know we need a result going into that game, I'm not sure we belong in the knockout stage if we cannot get it done (unless we snag results against Portugal and Germany instead). I also think we caught a break facing Ghana first without any distractions from any other results.

My point is that all other pots fell as they did, I would rate falling into Group G as the third worst scenario out of eight. I think we can expect to be involved in a lot of Group of Deaths in the future unless we improve our status to be regularly seeded.

Since Ronaldo went 66' I'd say he'll be good to go close to 90' vs germany and then us barring a setback.

We never score a lot og goals. Even against Antigua and barbuda we struggled to score. Maybe next cycle we will but we aren't an offensive team as of today. Thats what happens when you play a dedicated #6 in Beckerman and have 2 other midfielders like Jones and MB who are more holding midfielders then attacking midfielders no matter what "role" we play them in

skanglesDC

Post #28

Sunday June 15, 2014 2:53am

Joined Jan 2013
Total Posts: 2,334

Well written article by John Godfrey at ASN that notes it took 10 hours to get from Sao Paolo to Natal today with all of the traffic delays. It's completely ridiculous that we did not change our camp location once the draw was made.

Ghana sound so sure and cocky about the match. Hoopefully we can surprise them if they see us as 3 easy points So tired of them thinking they are sooo much better when the two matches were close scores and gameshttp://www.espnfc.us/team/ghana/4469/video/18...

MSantoine

Post #30

Sunday June 15, 2014 2:09pm

Joined Nov 2012
Total Posts: 2,330

Manaus did not look nearly as bad as they made it sound. Field held up the entire match and Italy's players seemed to be fine throughout